Here's the second column I wrote for the local community newspaper about Terrorism.  We published this in October 2001, only a month after 9/11.  Can you imagine having the audacity - or stupidity - to write humorously about "terrorism" so soon after the attack on the World Trade Center, etc.?  Well, neither can I.    I'm a dummy; what can I say? 

I may have published this on my blog before; I can't recall.  At any rate, most of you weren't reading me a year and a half ago.  So here it is:

**********

How to Talk to Your Children About Terrorism

In light of the rapidly unfolding events since September 11, our nation’s children are likely to be almost as caught up in the furor and frenzy about ‘terrorists’ and ‘terrorism’ as the adults are. Parents - and sometimes teachers, child care providers, or other child care workers - have a responsibility to defuse some of the children’s fear and anxiety by explaining the situation to them in simple, rational terms, and by answering any questions they may have with the calming force of logic and patient reassurance.

Young children’s questions should be relatively easy to answer.

Simon (young son): What’s ‘terrorism’, Daddy?

Dad: It’s when.....uhhh.....bad, evil people make you afraid by killing lots of innocent people in your country in.....errr.....violent ways.

S: You mean like when my friend Bobby’s daddy killed Bobby and Bobby’s mommy and Bobby’s sister?

D: Oh, no, not like that! Terrorists kill people for.....ummm.....political reasons, not personal reasons.

S: What’s ‘political reasons’, Daddy?

D: Well, like......hrrrm.....terrorists hate freedom.

S: Huh? I thought EVERYONE LIKES freedom! That’s what you told me before.

D: Well, yes, they.....arrgh.....these terrorists hate our AMERICAN kind of freedom.

S: WHY, Daddy? And do WE hate THEIR kind of freedom?

D: Eh? We sort of.....they don’t have.....why don’t you go and ask your mother?

If you think THAT was a tad awkward, your teenage or, God forbid, college-age children will pose even greater challenges. But in some mysterious fashion, the answers will actually become simpler.

Debbie (precocious teenage daughter): Mom, what exactly is ‘terrorism’ anyway?

Mom: Well, terrorism is when.....uhhh.....bad, evil people make you afraid by killing lots of innocent people in your country in.....errr.....violent ways.

D: So it’s like capital punishment in the state of Texas, then?

M: Pardon?

D: You kidding? Not in Texas!

M: What, dear?

D: Never mind. Anyway, Mom, President Bush said that “any nation that continues to harbor or support terrorism will be regarded by the United States as a hostile regime.” Don’t WE harbor terrorists? Haven’t a lot of them been living in the United States for quite a while?

M: Well, I’m sure President Bush didn’t mean THAT. I guess some of them have, but we didn’t know it, and we don’t condone it. And now we’re going to change it.

D: How?

M: By kicking them out or bringing them to justice.

D: Are we going to carpet-bomb Trenton, New Jersey like we’re carpet-bombing Afghanistan? And are we going to bomb wherever it is that Henry Kissinger lives?

M: Of course not, silly!

D: I won’t even ask what the difference is. How will we know who the terrorists are here in America?

M: Well, I’m not sure exactly. They’ll be foreign, of course, probably young Arab men as Peggy Noonan says.

D: But most young Arab men aren’t terrorists, are they? And some terrorists aren’t Arabs, right? Or even foreign? Timothy McVeigh and the Unabomber - they weren’t Arabs, were they? Or Henry Kissinger?

M: Why on earth do you keep bringing up Henry Kissinger? McVeigh and the Unabomber were just crazy. Anyway, our government will figure out who the Evil Doers are, hunt them down like dogs, and punish them. Our intelligence agencies are the most sophisticated in the world.

D: Then why weren’t they able to PREVENT the World Trade Center attacks, and all this anthrax stuff?

M: I don’t know the answer to that one, honey.

D: This Osama bin Laden guy - how will bombing innocent Afghan civilians bring him to justice?

M: I don’t know for sure, dear. Maybe the people in Afghanistan will get tired of being bombed, and kill him or turn him in or something.

D: Well, they’ll have a hard time doing that if they’re all dead, or weakened by starvation. And wasn’t that how it was supposed to work in Iraq with the sanctions, Mom? I’ve heard that over the past 10 or 11 years somewhere around a million and a half Iraqis have died, including a LOT of children, and Saddam Hussein is still in power. Isn’t that true?

M: Well.....former Secretary of State Madeline Albright said it was “worth the price.”

D: WHAT was worth the price? What have we gained? What has anyone gained? Don’t our government leaders ever learn ANYTHING? What are you TALKING about??

M: I’m not sure, honey.

D: Won’t all this bombing and sanctions have the OPPOSITE effect, of creating even more people who hate America? More terrorists like bin Laden?

M: I hope not, sweetheart. I don’t see how ANYONE could hate America. We’re a peace-loving people who believe in freedom and democracy.

D: You mean like in Florida last November, where a lot of African Americans weren’t allowed to vote, and Bush won the Presidency?

M: What are you implying? I don’t think our government would let anything happen that wasn’t LEGAL.

D: No?? Speaking of our government, what’s all this I keep hearing about ‘blowback’, about America itself being a terrorist, with the CIA instigating terrorism all around the world?

M: Now there’s no need to talk dirty, young lady! And surely you mean ‘investigating’ terrorism? If what you say were true, our elected representatives would certainly be doing something about it! I think that’s just the ‘blame America’ crowd talking. Sour grapes.

D: Sour grapes?? WHAT sour grapes???

M: Oh, you know. The ‘blame America’ crowd hates freedom and democracy.

D: Huh? Just like the Islamic ‘terrorists’, you mean? I thought EVERYONE LIKED freedom and democracy, other than a few despots. I thought the ‘blame America’ crowd, as you call them, is arguing that America PROCLAIMS freedom and democracy for all, but doesn’t consistently PRACTICE those things, except for when it benefits corporations and the rich.

M: Where on EARTH do you get all these ideas?? The United States has been a beacon of freedom in the world for over 200 years! [Quoting: “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.....”]

D: What about all the Native Americans we killed? And slavery?

M: Oh, honey, the Native Americans were savages. Noble, which is why we have them as team mascots. But still savages. And we’re SORRY about slavery, we really are. We shouldn’t have done it.

D: But we’ve never really officially apologized for slavery, have we? Or given any of their descendants reparations? Not even 40 acres and a mule?

M: Aren’t we wandering awfully far afield from our discussion of ‘terrorism’?

D: Not really. It seems to me that everything we’ve been talking about has to do with terrorism of one sort or another. Colonialism. Imperialism. First Europeans and then Americans consuming vast amounts of all kinds of resources, and doing WHATEVER it takes to get them. Isn’t that a common thread here? Isn’t that what all of this is REALLY all about?

M: Oh, sweetheart, I hate to see you becoming so cynical at such a young age! President Bush has never once mentioned ‘oil’ in any of his speeches to the American people about terrorism. America is the greatest and freest nation in the world. Just look at all the people from other countries who are struggling to come and live here!

D: Maybe that’s because we’ve helped make their lives in their native countries such a living hell.

M: Don’t you think that’s just a TINY BIT of an oversimplification, young lady? Why don’t you go and talk to your father about all of this? I’m sure HE can straighten you out!

So it's September 11 again.  Where were YOU five years ago when the two planes hit the World Trade Center?  I was probably sleeping at that time of the morning.  But later that day, as Editor at Large of a monthly community newspaper published entirely by volunteers through our local Independent Media Center, I had to begin making some critical decisions.  We had to essentially scrap the issue we were working on, and totally start from scratch with only two weeks to go until our publication deadline.  It was quite a hectic and emotion-laden time.  The adrenalin was definitely flowing.

Below I've reprinted the lead editorial that I wrote for that first post-9/11 issue of the newspaper.  It appeared on the front page above the fold.  You can decide, now in the light of five years of subsequent history, whether I wrote the right thing or not.

Meanwhile, did any of you see 60 Minutes last night?  It seems that a bunch of rescue workers, who spent months on "The Pile" at Ground Zero searching for survivors and then bodies, are now experiencing extreme respiratory distress.  And the Powers That Be are not wanting to pay them Worker's Compensation.  Now there's a couple of shockers, huh?

**********

September, 2001

            Prior to September 11,
we of the public i had a more mundane and diversified edition in
mind.  But the intervening events of that
unforgettable day have of necessity caused a much different version to
emerge.  Although literally billions of
words have already been spoken and written about those horrific incidents and
their aftermath, and billions more will doubtless be uttered, we crave your
indulgence as we present what we hope will be a slightly different perspective
from that to which you have been exposed to the point of exhaustion.

            Some of you reading
this issue will agree with everything that is said in these pages.  But others of you may find many of our words
disturbing, dissonant, perhaps even somewhat unpatriotic or insufficiently
reverent to the victims of the tragedy or their survivors.

            If the latter is your
reaction, we are deeply and sincerely sorry. 
But we feel that we must be true to our consciences and convictions, our
mission, our very reason for being.  It
goes almost without saying that we mourn with all of our hearts the innocent
American victims of the September 11 tragedy; how could we not?  And we love our country deeply. What we love
more, however, are the principles and ideals from which our country claims to
draw its strength and moral imperative, but from which we feel it has in many
ways strayed.  In our short existence as
the public i, we have tried to be, and we will continue to try to be, a
voice calling America back to those fundamental and precious principles.

            Some of us here at the
Independent Media Center, and some of you reading this, lived through the era
of the Viet Nam war.  There was
disagreement back then, too - often extremely vociferous disagreement - about what our nation should and should not do.  There was protest - deeply impassioned protest - against the policies of our government.  Now, with the hindsight of 30 years, the vast
majority of Americans (including the leading Army general of the era) agree
that it was an unjust and ill-advised war, fought in the wrong place at the
wrong time for the wrong reasons.

            Back then the
proponents of the war had their slogans. 
One of them was “Right or wrong, my country!”  Those of us who took the trouble to research
the origins of that slogan discovered, however, that it had been taken out of
context.  The full text of the original
statement read instead: “Right or wrong, my country.  If it’s right, keep it right.  If it’s wrong, MAKE it right.”

            We believe, as you
will discover from reading the contents of this issue, that the leaders of our
nation are exploiting our emotional vulnerability to lead us down a grievously
wrong and treacherous path.  Full-scale
war for the purpose of vengeance against an entire culture or continent of
people, and wholesale curtailment of our civil liberties here at home, all
under the guise of “rooting out terrorists and those who harbor them”, is in no
way the proper response to the tragedy of September 11, not even in
contemplation or as a rhetorical device. When our President says on national
television, “You’re either with us or with the terrorists,” some of us honestly
feel schizophrenic. Why? Because all too often historically, and right down to
the present moment, Americans have themselves been the terrorists. There are
other victims, too, in this world, for whom in many instances we bear direct
responsibility, and for whom we do not mourn. This is the part of the story
you’re not hearing in the mainstream media.

            While a criminal trial
in a world tribunal of justice may be entirely appropriate for the actual
direct accomplices of those who perpetrated the September 11 atrocity, should
they be apprehended, we must at the same time sincerely examine the military
and economic injustices our own country and its institutions routinely
perpetrate against other nations and peoples on a daily basis.  If we do not, we will remain trapped in an
ever-escalating spiral of mutually destructive ‘terrorism’ that is largely
of  America’s own making.

            Some of you who take
the trouble to read our words will find them deeply disturbing.  But 30 years from now, if you are alive to
remember them, you may find them chillingly prophetic.

Sorry I haven't updated recently.  I've been ill with something resembling the stomach flu for about a week, but am recovering now.

The worst thing about getting ill was that it happened 100 miles from home, at the apartment of a friend, a recovering alcoholic, who had essentially no furniture in the apartment he had just moved into.  In fact, the purpose of my trip was to take him some rudimentary furniture.  So until I was able to drive home, I had the choice of spending the day sitting on a task chair, sitting on his floor, or sleeping on a foam pad on the floor.  Perhaps needless to say, I spent much of my days (and nights) there sleeping.  Can you imagine how happy I was to finally get home and get reacquainted with my old RECLINER? 

I've been inspired by Fratmom's recent blog entry, featuring an artist in England who creates minuscule sculptures in the eyes of needles and on the heads of pins, to post the following photo, sent to me by EternalCrimsonWings, of tiny babies made by an unnamed Mexican woman out of an almond paste frosting called "marzipan".  Who could ever EAT one of these adorable little things?    I'd love to know if she makes them anatomically correct. 

**********
Edit:  We are informed by Fratmom, who researched this very thing at
snopes.com and left a comment, that  ".....the items pictured above are not made of marzipan, nor are
they edible. They're 2- to 5-inch sculptures created by artist Camille Allen .....and they're made from Prosculpt polymer clay and mohair."  Mea culpa.  I wasn't intending any macabre Freudian implications anyway.  I just thought the babies were another example of intriguing miniature art.  I still do.

**********

Speaking of Mexico (whence Camille Allen does probably NOT originate  ), my featured musical artists, Rodrigo (Sanchez) y Gabriela (Quintero), are a pair of young Mexican acoustic guitarists currently living in Dublin, Ireland.  In a world glutted with Spanish guitarists, their style is quite unique and eminently worth listening to.  I wish I knew how to create a link so that you could listen to their music while reading this.

I also wish that you could somehow hear the world music show I do on community radio every Thursday aftenoon.  Maybe some day I'll have a laptop computer and the ability to record and podcast my show.  Sharing the glorious gift of music with others, even when it is not music of my own creation, is quite probably the most pleasurable thing I do each week.

In my truck I carry - along with the spare blanket and the set of reflectors and enough other miscellaneous stuff to rebuild an engine on the side of the highway, or to completely supply a troop of Boy Scouts on a week-long camping trip - one of those cardboard sunshades, the kind you put in the windshield to keep the sun's rays out and render the interior of the vehicle bearable in the summer.   On the side that faces out it has a pair of hip blue sunglasses, while on the interior side it reads, in large red letters for use in case of emergency, "NEED HELP, PLEASE CALL POLICE."  The piece of cardboard completely covers the interior of the windshield.

I've had the truck since 1986, and have had the sunshade almost that long.  But only today did I notice that it has a list of instructions on the reverse side.  After explaining to me, in three steps, how to place the sunshade in the windshield, it contains this warning:

4. WARNING: DO NOT DRIVE WITH AUTO-SHADE IN PLACE.  REMOVE FROM WINDSHIELD BEFORE STARTING IGNITION.

I'm sure glad I discovered that warning today.  It may well have saved my life!  I take the timely discovery as a sign that Jesus is looking out for me.

From another contributor to The Wisdom Fund....

August 14, 2006
CraigMurray.org.uk

The UK Terror Plot: What's Really Going On?
by Craig Murray

[Craig Murray is the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan]

I have been reading very carefully through all the Sunday newspapers to try and analyse the truth from all the scores of pages claiming to detail the so-called bomb plot. Unlike the great herd of so-called security experts doing the media analysis, I have the advantage of having had the very highest security clearances myself, having done a huge amount of professional intelligence analysis, and having been inside the spin machine.

So this, I believe, is the true story.

None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time.

In the absence of bombs and airline tickets, and in many cases passports, it could be pretty difficult to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that individuals intended to go through with suicide bombings, whatever rash stuff they may have bragged in internet chat rooms.

What is more, many of those arrested had been under surveillance for over a year - like thousands of other British Muslims. And not just Muslims. Like me. Nothing from that surveillance had indicated the need for early arrests.

Then an interrogation in Pakistan revealed the details of this amazing plot to blow up multiple planes - which, rather extraordinarily, had not turned up in a year of surveillance. Of course, the interrogators of the Pakistani dictator have their ways of making people sing like canaries. As I witnessed in Uzbekistan, you can get the most extraordinary information this way. Trouble is it always tends to give the interrogators all they might want, and more, in a desperate effort to stop or avert torture. What it doesn't give is the truth.

The gentleman being "interrogated" had fled the UK after being wanted for questioning over the murder of his uncle some years ago. That might be felt to cast some doubt on his reliability. It might also be felt that factors other than political ones might be at play within these relationships. Much is also being made of large transfers of money outside the formal economy. Not in fact too unusual in the British Muslim community, but if this activity is criminal, there are many possibilities that have nothing to do with terrorism.

We then have the extraordinary question of Bush and Blair discussing the possible arrests over the weekend. Why? I think the answer to that is plain. Both in desperate domestic political trouble, they longed for "Another 9/11". The intelligence from Pakistan, however dodgy, gave them a new 9/11 they could sell to the media. The media has bought, wholesale, all the rubbish they have been shovelled.

We then have the appalling political propaganda of John Reid, Home Secretary, making a speech warning us all of the dreadful evil threatening us and complaining that "Some people don't get" the need to abandon all our traditional liberties. He then went on, according to his own propaganda machine, to stay up all night and minutely direct the arrests. There could be no clearer evidence that our Police are now just a political tool. Like all the best nasty regimes, the knock on the door came in the middle of the night, at 2.30am. Those arrested included a mother with a six week old baby.

For those who don't know, it is worth introducing Reid. A hardened Stalinist with a long term reputation for personal violence, at Stirling Univeristy he was the Communist Party's "Enforcer", (in days when the Communist Party ran Stirling University Students' Union, which it should not be forgotten was a business with a very substantial cash turnover). Reid was sent to beat up those who deviated from the Party line.

We will now never know if any of those arrested would have gone on to make a bomb or buy a plane ticket. Most of them do not fit the "Loner" profile you would expect - a tiny percentage of suicide bombers have happy marriages and young children. As they were all under surveillance, and certainly would have been on airport watch lists, there could have been little danger in letting them proceed closer to maturity - that is certainly what we would have done with the IRA.

In all of this, the one thing of which I am certain is that the timing is deeply political. This is more propaganda than plot. Of the over one thousand British Muslims arrested under anti-terrorist legislation, only twelve per cent are ever charged with anything. That is simply harrassment of Muslims on an appalling scale. Of those charged, 80% are acquitted. Most of the very few - just over two per cent of arrests - who are convicted, are not convicted of anything to do terrorism, but of some minor offence the Police happened upon while trawling through the wreck of the lives they had shattered.

Be sceptical. Be very, very sceptical.

MORE at http://www.twf.org/News/Y2006/0810-Terror.html

'War Is a Racket'

Excerpt from a speech delivered in 1933 by General
Smedley Darlington Butler, USMC. General Butler was the recipient of two Congressional
Medals of Honor - one of only two Marines so honored.

War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something
that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group
knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the
expense of the masses. . . .

There isn't a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang
is blind to. It has its "finger men" to point out enemies, its "muscle men" to
destroy enemies, its "brain men" to plan war preparations, and
a "Big Boss"
Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism. 

It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison.
Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty- three years and four months in
active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force,
the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to
Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high
class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In
short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it.
Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own
until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation
while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the
military service.

I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in
1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank
boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central
American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering
is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown
Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to
the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped
to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested.

During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell
racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few
hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I
operated on three continents. . . .

You can find the above excerpt here:  http://www.twf.org/News/Y2001/0911-Racket.html .  Unfortunately you can't read the full text of General Butler's speech unless you buy the book from Amazon.com by clicking on the picture of the book.

There is some other interesting stuff there on that site, too.  I personally subscribe to the e-mail mailing list of The Wisdom Fund, so that I can get another perspective on the world in which I live.

EDIT:  Has anyone seen Mike Wallace's recent interview of the President of Iran?  I saw the "raw, uncut" version on C-Span last night.  If you've seen it, I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about it.

Here's an interesting little graphic that recently "came across my desk", as they used to say.  The "ceasefire"  refers, of course, to the current hostilities between Israel and - who?  Lebanon?  Hezbollah?  The Palestinians?  In any event, perhaps we in America are isolationists after all?

NOTE: I've edited this since first writing it, so you may want to read it again even if you read it previously.

All right.  Yesterday's satire, funny/sad as it is, came originally from the parody site Whitehouse.org, according to a highly placed and eminently reliable source.  Who knew?    And I've been tagged by casey_at_bat and QueenPicky .  Here's my assignment:

Once you are tagged, you must post six things about yourself which are either weird, unusual, habitual, or are just plain fun to hear about (and true!). Once you post these things in your blog, you must gently tag six to ten others in the Xanga world, who then, in the spirit of not wussing out, must read words like these and follow the same rules you did.

And here are my answers, in no particular order:

1)  I've always been extremely squeamish about things that are alive and deformed, or dead and decomposing.   I've never been able to pick up dead animals, or even look at squashed animals along the side of the road.  Not only that, but when I would be mowing the lawn as a kid and would come upon rotten apples that had fallen from the neighbor's apple tree, I couldn't pick them up.  I'd have to look away from them while kicking them with my shoe under the fence and back into the neighbor's yard.  At the same time, as a firefighter I ran rescue calls for 16 years, and even forced myself to witness an autopsy in an attempt to desensitize myself.  It helped, but still I couldn't pick up a dead body or touch a badly mangled person.  Somehow, thankfully, I was always able to avoid those situations.

2)  My IQ has been tested about six times, and the scores have ranged from 134 at the low end to 184 at the high end.   I've passed the qualifying tests not only for Mensa but also for the International Society for Philosophical Enquiry , which purports to weed out the top one-tenth of one per cent intellectually.  But I have not deigned to join either organization, because I find them elitist and I don't quite see the point of belonging.  My Xanga readers are as interesting as anyone in those organizations could be, and probably a whole lot nicer.

I also hasten to add that I'm quite aware that traditional, standard IQ tests measure only a certain kind of intelligence, and there are a number of different kinds of intelligence, some of which I do NOT possess in abundance.  I once had a neighbor who was illiterate - incapable of reading or writng - but who could tear an automobile engine apart and put it back together practically blindfolded.  I am in awe of such intelligence.  There is also artistic intelligence, social intelligence, etc.

3)  As a result of involvement with a community radio station for the past slightly more than 3 years, my knowledge of and appreciation for what is called "world music" has gone from just about zero three years ago to fairly comprehensive today.

4)  As a city boy who didn't know how to do anything practical, I resolved after graduation from an Ivy League institution of higher learning that I would forego the "Military Industrial Complex" and teach myself how to work with my hands - do home repair, auto repair, gardening, etc.  I learned all those things to some extent during the decade of my twenties, but in the process I never learned how to earn money.  Then I got disabled.  Now I'm too old and fat and tired to do home repair, auto repair, and gardening.  I now realize that if I had learned how to earn money, I could have paid people to do all those other things for the rest of my life.

5)  When I was a kid growing up in Chicago, one of the things we used to do was throw eggs at cars.  I now know, of course, that that was a dastardly thing to do, but it seemed like a good idea at the time.  "Where did you get your eggs?" you ask.  Well, we pretended we were attending a birthday party and had been sent on a scavenger hunt.  On the list of items we were to get (which we had created ourselves) was "one raw egg".  EVERYONE has an egg in their refrigerator, right?  "How cute!" thought our neighbors as they handed us an egg.  "A RAW egg.  How creative of the party hostess!  They'll probably drop it and break it on the way back to the birthday party.  Hahaha!"  Little did they know that when we got about 12 eggs, we'd go over to the busy street and throw them at cars.

We also got money that way.  On our scavenger hunt list would be "one 1968 quarter" (let us say).  We'd get quite a lot of quarters.  But one time I got stupid.  "Oh, gosh," the lady of the house said.  "I have a 1967 quarter and a 1969 quarter, but no 1968.  I'm so sorry!"  "Oh, that's all right," I piped up.  "Any date will be all right."  "Just a minute," said the lady of the house.  "Let me go and get my husband."  So we idiotically waited until the husband came to the door.  He was about 7 feet tall and about 400 pounds of solid muscle, and told us that he just happened to be a Chicago cop.  Needless to say, he put the fear of God into us about fraudulent scavenger hunts....for a while. 

6)  I have twice, while on vacation in Los Angeles, tried to get on TV game shows.  One was an old one that no longer exists (except perhaps in rerun limbo) called The Joker's Wild (kind of a cheaper version of Jeopardy), and the other was Wheel of Fortune.  In both cases I passed their written test with flying colors, but wasn't chosen for the show.  One of the things they do is ask you to tell them a few biographical details about yourself.  While I am indisputably one of the most interesting people I know, I figure I got beat out by the guy who claimed to have won the International Monopoly Championship in Monte Carlo the previous year. 

Well, this was fun and I could undoubtedly come up with more, but we'll save that for another time.  Now whom should I "gently" tag?  I can't remember whom I tagged before.  They should be people who visit my site at least semi-regularly, and to whom I subscribe.  I dunno.  How about the exquisite MaVicious , my perspicacious paramour  EternalCrimsonWings , the misnamed mybaddy , the redoubtable and calcium-rich THDmilkman , the irrepressible and iconoclastic DailyKevin (aka Kevin72) , the lovely-but-with-thorns angryflower1 , and of course - of course! - my virtual adopted daughter Anne_Lanche ?  Have fun with it, ladies and gentlemen. 

In the past week or so I've been quite a bit busier than I normally am.  I've been tagged by two different people, and I haven't forgotten.  I also have another web site I want to make you aware of.  Meanwhile, though, here's a marvelous satire lifted from wunderkind348's blog , with her permission.  I think Amara wrote it herself, but I'm not absolutely certain.  At any rate, enjoy.  And thanks as always for reading and commenting.

Satire

And why would you? It took you fuckrods a whole year before you realized I really HAD gone and invaded a country on the cheap without so much as a battle plan purely to avenge my wimpy pappy's honor. Either you super-noble citizen heroes lost your zipper marbles, or were hedging your bets by waiting to see which side of history came out on top. I dunno. Good job though.

It's times like these that I have to salute the American public school system, because without it, Americans might have a sense of history – I Love the 80's notwithstanding. Yale history degree or not, I sure as fuck don't. If Americans had any sense of history, then they'd know that You-Know-What #1 and #2 both started because of tangled alliances, and proxy battles fought by pipsqueak players on behalf of bloated world powers. And it don't get more bloated than the USA; the only difference being Old Europe was a bunch of fatso dandies with walrus moustaches, whereas AMERICA IZ TEH ROXXORZ!

You know, it's hard to stay the course when the road is paved with improvised explosive devices. But I'm a leader. I lead. Lookit me! I cross my fingers, pray to Jesus, and send other people's sons to travel the road well-sabotaged. So until further notice, I'm declaring everything hunky dory. And that's an order. (Thumbs up.)

I don't think I get enough credit for how totally right I was about the Axis of Evil; boy howdy I was right. Too bad I've never had no idea how to deal with them, besides acting all coy, and bitchy, and then showing how manly we are by throwing billions of dollars worth of bombs, corporate contracts, and human souls into the bottomless pit that is Vietraq. Fuck man, we showed them!

Now as I mentioned to Tony Poppins at summer camp this week, we all know that if Iran and Syria stopped supplying Hizzzz-booolah and Hambone with rockets, and guns, and juice boxes... then KABLOWIE! Everything's raining candy bars, you know? Dude, it's so simple. If people would just do what I tell them, we wouldn't have no problems. Earth would be like a DEKE kegger and heaven combined! I could sign an executive order moving happy hour up to three in the afternoon!

Clearly, the Jews are the chosen people. Chosen by Yahweh to kick fucking ass! And that's what they're doing: freaking out and maiming and slaughtering Islamoids. It's kind of beautiful. At least until Jesus comes back and fries their Christ-killing asses. Anyway, I give them another week to turn Lebanon into Iraq II, then we nuke Syranistan together. Then we'll crack up over the phone and maybe I'll take a nap after.

Y'see, the Iranian regime is evil. They are bad. Iran is run by a paranoid, parochial social club of intolerant, sexless men who think God talks to them and them only. Trust me, I know the type. Them Iranians got a real hard-on to be the boss of Oilrabia, and we can't let them do that. No sir. Because there is no looming energy crises. American reserves the right to suck this rock dry and by the time that happens, I have an alternative energy plan that will work. Ever seen Jurassic Park? That's right – we'll just grow us some brontosauruses and squeeze the liberty nectar outta them. A-booya.

There are some who are beginning to grumble about Something-Something Three. They talk on the TV, acting like they know what's the 411 on 666. Why is it that every time some American, who should be happy every minute that he or she lives in this neat-o Gulag-Mart of a country, feels he has to take his FREEDOM^® seriously and start mouthing off from his heart and mind. I will TELL you what's happening in the Middle East, got it?

Ahem. So, what's happening in the Middle East? That depends on what your definition of "is" is. I can tell you what ISN'T happening: abused and threatened nation-states marginalized by this administration, and sanctioned to within an inch of their existences are totally not going off the deep end. These deluded countries that pour all of their meager resources into building up their militaries at the expense of their populace are so not trying to protect their turf from total annihilation by the US. They're also not laying sneaky traps, luring America and its ally Israel into accelerating the Middle East's hatred of both. These guys aren't batshit powermongers lusting for regional hegemony, and the spoils therein.

Meanwhile, North Korea is also not in constant contact with Iran, and is not taking pot shots all over the Pacific, baiting Japan. Russia and China are not checking America's influence in the world by offering silent patronage to Syria, Iran, and North Korea. And let's dispel this rumor right here and now – just because 6,000 or so Iraqazoids have been killed in sectarian violence in less than two months doesn't mean it's a civil war. ARE WE FUCKING CLEAR ON THIS??? Good.

Just think, 2000 years of western civilization, 2,000 years of advances in science, philosophy, industry, art, and social experimentation, 2,000 years of collected wisdom and experience have climaxed in my leadership. What could go wrong? Just in case Israel's berserker campaign to fight the termites in their house by setting it on fire continues, and starts throwing off the top secret Rapture sked, I'm sending Condi over there to triumphantly take charge, gloves off, to do what she does best – dick all.

To those Americans still trapped in Lebanon, I say – are you really THAT American you'd be vacationing in Lebanon? If you really are American, then take heart. I'm sending Michael "Brownie" Brown over there to organize the evacuation, so just sit back and relax; you'll end up a floating corpse any day now. In the meantime, make reservations with the State Department; they accept all major credit cards. FREEDOM^® ain't free. Ironic, huh?

In closing, everything is fine, folks. We've got the most powerful military in the world stretched to the breaking point over the rack of incompetence, and to those of you who've ever played RISK – you know that that's the way to win a war. Not that there's a war going on. Nope. "Mission Accomplished" and all that pish-posh. I've got it all under control. We anticipated all of this. This isn't big, stupid, arrogant America thinking brute force is a substitute for pussy-assed brainiac "strategy". We are not on the brink of a world war that will put an end to the Great Post-911^TM Party and force us all to sober up and own our fuck-ups. Nope. Nuh-uh.

Look into my eyes America. Deep, deep into my eyes. Think of something happy. A surfboard you want to purchase. A double cheeseburger. Perhaps re-watching TiVO'd episodes of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. Stare into my eyes, crank up FOX News and sleep. Sleep.

Sleeeeeeeeeep.